A new FBI report indicates that there is no evidence that George Zimmerman's shooting of Trayvon Martin was motivated by race.

The head of Britain's Secret Intelligence Services told a group of high-ranking civil servants that he believes Iran is two years away from building a nuclear bomb.

About 200 Occupy movement protesters in Los Angeles clashed with 140 police Thursday night over chalk drawings during the monthly Art Walk gallery event downtown. Participants claimed the protest was over previous arrests of people writing on the sidewalk with chalk. Police confirmed some of the 17 arrested last night were also for drawing on the sidewalk.

Digg, once a pioneer in social media story-sharing technology, was sold Thursday for $500,000. It was once valued at $160 million, but suffered from a significant loss of users over the past few years as Twitter and Facebook grew, offering other avenues to share content online with friends.

Oakland, Calif., pot dispensary Harborside Health Center is resisting efforts by the federal government to shut down their clinic, and they have the support of community leaders. U.S. Attorney Susan Haag is attempting to seize the center's property, which also the home of an unrelated security company that could be shut down as well. Oakland's own city attorney declared Haag's actions a waste of resources.

President Barack Obama declared that Mitt Romney is "not serious" about fighting the deficit if Romney is not willing to let a tax cut for income greater than $250,000 a year lapse. At the same time, the Obama Administration is encouraging states to seek out waivers to loosen the rules of a federal grant welfare-to-work program approved under President Bill Clinton. Is anybody serious about fighting the deficit?

Editor's Note: We invite comments and request that they be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of Reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment for any reason at any time. Report abuses.

Police confirmed some of the 17 arrested last night were also for drawing on the sidewalk.

What about that kid, walking down the sidewalk and finding pictures of pee-pees and wee-wees in chalk drawings? Doesn’t he deserve better? Look, if you think this is about class warfare, you’d better think again. This is about that kid’s right to take a walk without getting his mind warped. Or maybe that turns you on, Occupiers… Maybe that’s how you get your kicks… You and your goodtime buddies… I’ve got a flash for you, joy boys. Partytime is over.

My only question is was the art any good? If it was, then leave them alone. If it wasn’t, considering the generally low quality of hipster retard art and graffiti it probably wasn’t, then lock them up.

What about the kid walking down the street and has to suffer through looking at third grade level scrawls and the hipster retard who painted them? What about that kid fist?

I had a friend back there who thought he was THE sage on media and good taste, and had a rather derisive opinion for my Seinfeld fandom. I insisted we were going to watch Seinfeld that night, as a new episode was airing, and it was that episode. He really hated me after that for showing him up to be the pretentious jerk wad asshole know nothing he was and I assume still is.

He would never have used ‘Gabbo’, or a nick, anything short of the full name would have been a display of ignorance, and the paraphrase is only a paraphrase in the sense that the colloquial expressions I used to make it intelligible to conversational conventions would have never parted his lips either. I hung around him for the entertainment value of his damaged psyche. Tulpa would get all the free meals and drinks he ever wanted given what I find amusing.

I’m sad for Hugh then. If you can’t appreciate a show where super hot female assassins are sent over when the doctor orders women for a party from an escort service turn into hideous fly women because the doctor hedged the chances of getting laid (from escorts!) with a super Spanish fly concoction then you have no business living.

Tulpa, 19 losers from Saudi Arabia can kill 2800 Americans and shut down New York. You people are living in the past. We live in an age where any loser can cause tremendous harm.

I had no idea that John was so pathetic and cowardly. It goes well beyond his usual personal attacks, misuse and misspelling of simple words, and general ignorance.

It’s just… sad that a grown adult lives in the kind of abject terror which that quote shows. I think the worst part though, is the ridiculous mental contortions Johns uses to justify such a craven mindset.

I mean, he’s afraid of dirt poor brown people 5000 miles away and thinks his cowardice is sufficient reason to kill them in their mud huts…

I in contrast knew quite well you are an idiot Mary. Tens of thousands of people all over the world have been murdered by terrorists of all colors. It is not hard to build a bomb and blow people up, especially if you are willing to die with your bomb. It is called asymmetric warfare.

Now lay off the bath salts and take your meds like your kids want you to take. The adults are talking.

My sister told me she thought I wrote this article under a pseudonym. I told her there wasn’t enough government blaming for me to have written that.

Imagine you have a brother and he’s an alcoholic. He has his moments, but you keep your distance from him. You don’t mind him for the occasional family gathering or holiday. You still love him. But you don’t want to be around him.

This is how I lovingly describe my current relationship with the United States. The United States is my alcoholic brother. And although I will always love him, I don’t want to be near him at the moment.

“Furthermore, the whole me being a liar thing makes zero sense. If I were to be lying, the obvious purpose would be to slur the TSA, correct? If I were slurring the TSA, why the fuck would I try to be covering it up?”

Because it got bigger than you wanted and you realized you were going to get caught lying, you fucking asshole.

I mean, he’s ACTUALLY SO FUCKING STUPID that he didn’t realize he’s talking to the only person here who routinely hates authority more than sarc and sloopy, but because he HAS to insult me for pointing out he’s a coward, he makes a fool of himself with a profoundly stupid accusation.

I mean, he’s ACTUALLY SO FUCKING STUPID that he didn’t realize he’s talking to the only person here who routinely hates authority more than sarc and sloopy

Whoa, whoa, whoa, you have crossed a line there. I can compete in any pig hating contest and hold my own thank you very much. While Sarc in downloading gigabytes of porn, I, on the other hand, feed a continuous rage against all that is authority.

After interviewing nearly three dozen people in the George Zimmerman murder case, the FBI found no evidence that racial bias was a motivating factor in the shooting of Trayvon Martin, records released Thursday show.

From NBC News: After interviewing nearly three dozen people in the George Zimmerman murder case, the FBI found…evidence that racial bias was a motivating factor in the shooting of Trayvon Martin, records released Thursday show.

Hint to that guy: If you’re looking to impress people, don’t admit to not knowing very basic history.

That you’re so stupid as to be “stumped” by statements like, “Hitler was primarily defeated by Russia (not us), Native Americans were wiped out by a plague (not us),” etc., casts huge doubt on all of your other bullshit generalizations.

And if he truly has lived in the south (or the northeast, for that matter), and thinks Americans don’t know how to show gratitude… he is not a reliable observer. Really, the more I read, the more this guy looks to be a social midget. I imagine he has the rapist face of Jonah from Veep.

I know I am going to get slammed, but I pretty much agree with this dude. We are only god at incarcerating people people, bombing brown people, and spending on war. Yet, we somehow think we are the shit.

I really don’t give a fuck how we nearly wiped out the indians, whether it was a plauge, we shot them all, or they died on forced marches, but it was pretty fucked up how they were treated.

Gee, I find it rather remarkable how almost all of our left-wing griefer trolls just happened to take the day off today on the same day! O3 and Tony Krugnuts were the only ones I saw here at all today.

It’s making me think that Shrieking Idiot might actually be just another one of Mary Stack’s ten or twenty different personae.

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) — a laser test facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif. — turned on its 192 laser beams for a scant instant the day after the nation celebrated its birth, unleashing a record-setting 1.85-megajoule blast into a target chamber that delivered more than 500 trillion watts of power.

“It’s a chemical laser but in solid, not gaseous, form. Put simply, in deference to you, Kent, it’s like lasing a stick of dynamite. As soon as we apply a field, we couple to a state that is radiatively coupled to the ground state. I figure we can extract at least ten to the twenty-first photons per cubic centimeter which will give one kilojoule per cubic centimeter at 600 nanometers, or, one megajoule per liter.”

That’s what they should do. A Jerry Hathaway story. They’d muck up a total reunion, but maybe just something focusing on him. After all, it was strongly implied that he had certain hammering skills–sure the women would like to learn more.

This is incorrect. I am serious about fighting the deficit and have an open invitation to every government in this country to solve their budgetary woes. Send me your budgets, some napalm, and a napalm-delivery system, and our troubles here will be over very quickly.

A Georgia girl told investigators she spent days at a time locked inside a small outhouse and a chicken coop, and had to wear a shock collar because she didn’t do her school work, authorities said Thursday.

Didn’t want to get involved. Just like Spanier, Paterno, et al. Why is it so easy for many people to turn a blind eye to immoral, outrageous and criminal conduct when they are personally innocent of wrongdoing and will probably win high praise for turning in the bastards????

so you think the support reflected in the polls is the entertainment value he brings? That must be it – a broad swath of the public believes the more gridlock there is, the more difficult it is for govt to do harm. If Romney wins, he might have some Congressional help in doing something. But things as they are ensures more kabuki, more Biden, and of course, more Obie-isms.

Pythons have been spotted as far north as Manatee County-just a short slither from Tampa. In my little piece of southern Hillsborough County there are gators galore and I would gladly lend some to my Tampa neighbors. Capture and delivery not included.

Government passes drunk driving laws fining people thousands of dollars, and the laws are later found to be unconstitutional. But, according to the judge, since the government’s intentions were all good, they can keep the money.

It is worse than that. He claims with a straight face that he just worked too hard on getting the policies right. Just what policy did he ever get right?

Ooh jesus. Not that excuse. Somewhere here I’ve got a rule about politicians and upper management who, after being caught doing something unethical say something to the effect of, “My mistake was that I was too passionate about my job and doing the work of my[constituents/company], which led me to some questionable choices”

I credit Lakoff with tremendous insight into the human mind and how it works….but his politics are vile. Were I to meet him I would shake his hand for writing ‘metaphors we live by’ and ‘philosophy in the flesh’. Then I would knock his fucking nose flat and kick him in the balls for his politics.

Yet Democrats have too often failed to use language linking their moral values with their policies. The Little Blue Book demonstrates how to make that connection clearly and forcefully, with hands-on advice for discussing the most pressing issues of our time: the economy, health care, women’s issues, energy and environmental policy, education, food policy, and more.

Oh now I remember this guy. He’s one of those, “it’s not our policies, it’s our marketing.”

I wonder if the Occupy/Chalk thing had anything to do with the a-hole cop in Richmond VA who recently arrested a little girl for drawing in chalk on a rock on a public river beach. The po-po shares “intel” all the time, except it’s often the low-quality and hysterical (not funny hysterical, but crazy hysterical).

Also, the freaking F.B.I. got involved in the Martin case and is investigating Zimmerman? Seriously? All because of a stupid little punk who happened to be black and Al Sharpton’s big mouth? This government has gone absolutely stark raving loony.

I’m sure you’re right. But seriously, this is incredible. Literally dozens of kids and young adults have been killed in the streets of Chicago in the last several weeks, almost all of them black, and nobody gives a crap, least of all Obama, Holder, and Sharpton. George Zimmerman on the other hand has to become a federally investigated case because he’s white. It’s just absolutely disgusting in every regard.

Our local paper reported the Zimmerman story with the headline: “FBI says Zimmerman ‘decent guy’ but has a ‘hero complex’.

The whole story was about how Zimmerman was well liked in the community, easily went between different racial and ethnic groups, spoke Spanish and English equally well. The last quote was from a local cop, outside of the investigation, who said he didn’t think Z was racist, perhaps he had a ‘little bit of a hero complex’ that led him to confront Trayvon.

See if you can then come up with the same story headline. Nope, never any bias in the media.

Literally dozens of kids and young adults have been killed in the streets of Chicago in the last several weeks, almost all of them black, and nobody gives a crap, least of all Obama, Holder, and Sharpton.

Well the killers were most likely black themselves. Although there’s plenty of Hispanic-on-black crime and vice versa here in Southern California, and that never seems to warrant any civil rights investigations.

It is simple…they knew the racism charge was crap, and now they feel safe announcing it since the state authorities are doing yeoman’s work prosecuting and locking Z up. No need for the feds to get involved.

what’s crystal clear to me is that if the exact same fact pattern was present, but zimmerman was a cop and he had shot martin, very few if any of the zimmerman defenders here would be defending him. they would be confident he had animus, he was a paranoid racist, and that he should go to prison.

zimmerman gets far more benefit of the doubt from the bigots because he was not a cop

i just simply look at the case facts. zimmerman’s case, like many cop shootings that are criticized here has a preponderance of evidence justifying the shooting

First, cops because they are supposed to be trained professionals whose job it is to protect the public are always going to be and should be held to a higher standard. Since cops are trained and have other means of force besides their gun, I am going to expect them to take actions that I would never expect of a non cop. And because of this, they are going to get less benefit of the doubt. Sorry, if you want the authority to shoot people you better be willing to accept the responsibility of being held to a higher standard.

Second, show me a case on Reason where the facts are anything near like this? The cases that get discussed on reason involve cases like the BART Cop or other cops just shooting people.

and if zimmerman was a cop, people here would be screaming that the racist cop shot an unarmed black teenager with no criminal record, and no evidence he was using deadly force against zimmerman and bla bla bla

the fact that you can’t see that, despite the metric assload of absurdly double standard using posters here is amazing, but typical.

i support the right of self defense, cop OR citizen. many people here want cops held to a higher standard, as you do.

cops frequently ACT at a higher standard, but the LEGAL requirement should not be thus. i’m doing what i need to do to go home alive and uninjured at night. and i know that i will be judged fairly, not under some ridiculous standard that an anti-cop bigot such as you wants to judge me on

Dunphy lots of people on here, RC and Fluffy most particularly, claimed just that about Zimmerman.

Second, I don’t care what the law is. I am talking about the moral standard. And I am sorry, the cops should not have a right to summarily execute anyone who attacks them.

Your job is to get hurt and injured so other people don’t have to. That is what makes being a cop a noble profession. If you don’t like that and think you should be able to shoot people to just avoid injury, then stop claiming any kind of nobility and admit you are just an armed ape.

1) most anti-cop animus here is earned by cops. 2) if Zimmerman had been a cop, the confrontation probably would not have turned violent, unless someone thinks Trayvon would have knowingly attacked a cop.

again, there is a huge double standard here. the case where the cop shot the guy who swung the bag containing beer bottles at the cops head was EASILY more justifiable than the zimmerman case. but people here were apoplectic about it.

and there is zero doubt if the exact same fact pattern presented EXCEPT zimmerman was a cop, the bigots would be confident zimmerman was both racist and unjustified and people here would be writing hagiographies about poor trayvon martin brutalized and killed by the racist trigger happy cop, for merely “walking while black”

Since when is a bag of bottles a deadly weapon? And in many states there is a duty to retreat. IN those states a civilian would be guilty of murder under those circumstances Dunphy.

And what about the BART cop who murdered a guy and barely got three years because he claimed he meant to taser him? What about the cops in Atlanta who shot an old woman and let her bleed to death on the floor

I can tell you right now Dunphy cops have earned the disdain they get. I am a law and order guy. I was a prosecutor and gladly sent people to jail for decades. And I fucking hate cops. They are nothing but abusive bullies who are completely out of control in many places.

I have known a lot of cops, some from a previous profession and others just from having lived in the same place for a while. By and large, good folks. But the badge is tarnished by the type stories we see here, usually involving unarmed and hardly dangerous subjects. I get that you’re a cop and you take the attacks personally. I used to be a news reporter but my sympathy for journalism gets tempered by the profession’s lack of self-respect.

Are all cops bad? No, though others here will certainly disagree. But enough of them are and, what’s worse, the profession tolerates them instead of tossing their asses into the street or, when warranted, into jail.

Again, had Zimmerman been a cop, his initial encounter with Martin would have gone much differently. While a punk who was likely to end up dead and/or in jail at some point, I doubt Trayvon would have jumped someone he knew to be a cop. Plus, there are the marks on Z’s head.

Are all cops bad? No, though others here will certainly disagree. But enough of them are and, what’s worse, the profession tolerates them instead of tossing their asses into the street or, when warranted, into jail.

The problem, as everywhere, is fucking unions that impose ridiculous work “conditions”, defend the most reprehenisble behavior and create a general culture of contempt for the employers, who in the case of cops are the general public.

Cops today have the same social standing as steel and auto workers in the 70s, ie over paid, over pampered assholes that deserve to be taken down several notches, despite the fact that a large number of them may be honest hard workers.

And someone just said today that you argued honestly. I hope they’re still around. This bottles bullshit has been pointed out to you several times, yet you still insist on saying bottles instead of cans.

dunphy – do you think a cop would get himself into a situation like Zimmerman did? Cops have clubs, tasers, radios, and backup. It seems to me that a good cop could not be in the same situation. I think that’s why people expect a higher standard. Your training and support system gives you more options and preparedness.

again, there is a huge double standard here. the case where the cop shot the guy who swung the bag containing beer bottles at the cops head was EASILY more justifiable than the zimmerman case. but people here were apoplectic about it.

Oh, bullshit. It’s not more justifiable because A. the cop wasn’t alone, B. he wasn’t getting his head pounded on the concrete, C. he had other weapons available.

First off, you’re full of shit. The visible wounds and eyewitnesses are what give hem the benifit of the doubt. If you recall, when it happened, before those details were revealed, most of us (including myself) were ready to declare him guilty.

Second, if you weren’t full of shit (though you are), it’d be because he didn’t choose a career where he was required to lock people in a cage for buying or selling goods or services that weren’t “approved” by our rulers.

I’m starting to think you might have the right idea. It’s really tiring to go around correcting all of his constant lies. Then when you completely show him for the lying shit stain he is, he just stops for a week, then comes back with the same damn arguments that have been proven wrong and demands for citations he’s been shown a hundred times before.

“overwhelming support for police” – it’s like 60/40 at best

“hit him with bottles” – there are no bottles made in that size.

“drug dogs are accurate and not a rubber stamp” – no matter how much info you show him, he keeps up with that shit.

“cops don’t shoot a lot of dogs” – hit him with dozens of citations on that one.

“tasers are no more dangerous than other methods” – hit him with a multi-city study on that one, and he still refuses to concede.

what’s crystal clear to me is that if the exact same fact pattern was present, but zimmerman was a cop and he had shot martin, very few if any of the zimmerman defenders here would be defending him.

I don’t agree with you on much Dunphy, but I will probably give you this point. I would like to say that everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt and a fair trial before they are found guilty in the court of public opinion.

That being said, I think cops should be scrutinized more because of the badge they wear. They are enforcers of the law, so they should not be allowed to flaunt it. There were not too many people trying to bash the cop who shot the transient on the BART platform because the guy threw a knife at him. Shooting a dog or a grandfather, or speeding through a 25 mph residential area and killing 3 women–and then getting off with no criminal charges!–is anathema to equal protection under the law.

I don’t agree with you on much Dunphy, but I will probably give you this point.

Really? You don’t remember the almost unanimous “string him up” sentiment around here before we realized we were lied to about the details? And do you really think that if eye witnesses saw someone beating a cop on the ground, and that person had no damage to him whatsoever, that we wouldn’t think it was self defense if the cop shot him?

“The state attorney’s office says Zimmerman wrongly assumed Trayvon was a criminal, and says he did not suffer injuries serious enough to require deadly force to defend himself.”

Uh…..if you have to suffer serious injuries to justify using deadly force to defend yourself, I think the state attorney’s office is going to have to look into many, many shootings where cops…..oh shit, nevermind.

If you wait until you have injuries serious enough to to require deadly force, you may no longer be able to defend yourself. He was getting his head slammed into concrete. Should he have waited until he was unconscious? The prosecutor over-charged for political reasons and is trying to cover her very exposed ass.

the standard for both cops and “civilians” is that you reasonably perceive that you face imminent danger of serious bodily injury or death.

there are other factors that can justify a shooting,but that’s the most common one(for example, a prison guard can, in most cases, shoot a convict trying to escape).

there are other examples, too.i had a case once where a guy who had already had a warrant out for murder had also threatened to kill a witness in my area.we found him driving down the street and got in a pursuit. he jumped from the car and ran.

could i have shot him in the back? yes. based on the totality of the circs, he was a fleeing violent felon AND i had reason to believe that if not apprehended he posed a danger to society (and specifically the witness) , and specifically of death

regardless, we didn’t shoot him. we tackled him.

but laurab is correct, neither cop nor “civilian’ need wait UNTIL they are seriously injured (for the legal definition of “serious injury) to use deadly force.

if they REASONABLY perceive it’s imminent, that the perp is attempting to use such force against them, then they can shoot

period. full stop

zimmerman did everything that innocent (or people who think they are innocent) do. he cooperated with police, he provided a statement, and his prosecution is PURELY political, like some prosecutions of cops i might add.

he should prevail and i hope he wins a suit for malicious prosecution, although i think that unlikely(the latter)

Fuck you Tulpa. That one word belies an entire mindset that disqualifies any argument you want to make. Your cop fellating is growing tiresome (and I’m not one of those people that completely hates cops).

ridley scott did not want the narration originally. he thought it was distracting and the movie didn’t need it. the studio made him include it because they thought the movie would be too confusing for viewers w/o it.

since i saw it originally with the narration, it’s impossible for me to say how i would have reacted to seeing it ORIGINALLY w/o the narration, but i own the version w/o the narration and imo it’s a better version, having seen both

The narration made it more Noir-ish. I’ve lobbied for years that the Narration version was superior. I also believe that some of the conspiracy theories of Harrison’s performance of the narration are unfounded– made up by aspiring film-school hipsters to drive their agenda.

Ford hated the narration himself, it was turgid and lifeless like he was being forced to read from the dictionary. There’s world-weary and then there’s bored, that guy was just bored when telling the audience the story which consequently drains the energy right out of the movie.

I was at a private screening of Gladiator with Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe. After the screening, we were doing a Q and A with them, and we were told “only questions about Gladiator“. The first hand that went up was a fanboi who immediately asked some stupid question about Blade Runner. Ridley, who had had several gin and tonics by this point, sneers and goes “I don’t see why everyone makes such a big deal about that movie”. It totally crushed fanboi, and we proceeded on. Hilarious.

That is a great story. I like Blade Runner. But its fan boys kind of ruin it. It is not that fucking deep and in many ways was kind of an interesting failure of a movie. I wish they would give it break.

Ridley was quite loaded. So was Crowe. So it was fun. This was at HBO studios in New York.

But yeah, people need to chill on Blade Runner. It’s a very interesting movie, but I understand Ridley’s frustration as he’s done plenty of other really good movies. I’m a big fan of the under-appreciated White Squall myself.

The wild and ongoing love of Blade Runner is a testament to the lack of good science fiction movies overall. The only major literary genre Hollywood and TV shits on more is Fantasy, and after the Lord of The Rings and Game of Thrones they aren’t doing so bad.

Saw Gladiator at the theater, and renamed it Glad it’s over. I just caught it on HBO earlier on Monday, and actually liked it. And I agree, Oliver Reed was great casting. The whole film was cast well. Overall, I’m a fan of his work. His brother’s work as well. They are good directors who make entertaining films. Really, isn’t that all we want from going to the movies?

Agreed that Gladiator is overrated–still a good film and fun to watch, but Crowe just sulks and scowls throughout the entire movie and Joaquin Phoneix is not very convincing in attempting to portray Commodous as a psychopath.

It’s only saved by Oliver Reed’s performance and some great battle scenes.

Yeah but for every Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones there are about two dozen Twilights (in the fantasy genre). And for every Firefly… who am I kidding? You were right: they don’t even try with sci-fi.

The original ending (of the first run film) just about ruined the whole fucking movie. I was 19 and with a date and she kinda freaked out when I stood up and started cursing the movie screen.It was some time later before I learned Scott didn’t intend to totally ruin what was otherwise a masterpiece.

Asked what I was doing in DC on New Years eve by a reasonably attractive lady when I lived there briefly in the early 90’s. Don’t recall the answer I gave, but the one in my head was, ‘reasonably attractive women here stuck on New Years Eve with far fewer selective choices for hook ups than almost anywhere else out the boondocks.’

Within the next year or two, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security will instantly know everything about your body, clothes, and luggage with a new laser-based molecular scanner fired from 164 feet (50 meters) away. From traces of drugs or gun powder on your clothes to what you had for breakfast to the adrenaline level in your body?agents will be able to get any information they want without even touching you.

It’s Lena Headey, not Headley, you clod. And I already knew she was going to be good because of her role as Sarah Connor in The Sarah Connor Chronicles (thanks again for canceling a show I really like, Fox!). But she’s much better looking with dark hair (her natural color).

If Fast and Furious was a Bush scandal he’d scream about it on here every damn day. Fuck shrike. Just another partisan cunt. The trolls are fucking cancer they refuse to cut out of this place for some baffling reason.

In June, Rebecca Watson, a skeptic blogger and speaker, canceled her TAM appearance because, she said on her blog, she does “not feel welcome or safe.”

I could probably look it up on her blog or something, but I wonder if this is just because of the hotel elevator incident at another incident a while back, or if there are other reasons she has for feeling this way.

Other nontheists — both male and female — have shared stories of unwanted sexual attention at nontheist gatherings, including propositions for sex and unwelcome touching.

Now I just want to know who’s going to these things. Is it people who are really that socially inappropriate? Or are they just easily offended? Some of this is making them sound a bit more on the socially bizarre/inept side…

I guess I would just like to know more about the “unwelcome touching”–it’s not like, you know, people don’t get actually molested from time to time. One quote that made me feel like shit might be weird:“We are a small movement, so it might be very important for some men and women to find a partner who shares their beliefs,” said Maggie Ardiente, director of development for the American Humanist Association, which recently adopted a sexual harassment policy. “That does not mean sexual attention, when it is clearly rejected, is allowed. We need to be clear that these events are a great way to meet people, but there are appropriate ways to conduct yourselves. There are common-sense ways to address this for both men and women.”

The fact that she begins by talking about how they know people go to these things looking to meet a romantic partner, and then feels the need to specify, “But guys, no raping”…I mean, again, when she says “sexual attention” she might mean “making a pass at someone very sensitive,” but something about this reads weird to me. “appropriate ways to conduct themselves”, “common-sense ways to address this”…I’m getting a “there are a bunch of freaking weirdos at our events” vibe from that.

..I’m getting a “there are a bunch of freaking weirdos at our events” vibe from that.

True, but weird doesn’t mean rapey. It just means that all of their sexual advances will be unwanted ones. Which includes “Hi, what’s your name?” (and I have seen men called creepy rapists for nothing more than that. Weird men, true, but sometimes that is literally all that it takes.)

This could probably be resolved by showing them the Tom Brady SNL skit at the beginning of every conference.

Bottom line, if you look at pictures of these events, you can pretty much tell that the only rapists would be the “she’s in bed with me, might as well go for it” types. And there is nothing to fear from those guys if you’re not sleeping in a bed with them (an that, by the way, is one of the stupidest damn habits to come out of the MTV generation “I don’t know you well enough to have sex with you yet, so lets just sleep in the same bed after making out).

an that, by the way, is one of the stupidest damn habits to come out of the MTV generation

Is that for real? Sounds like some women get off on emasculating guys, and the guys they do it to are such huge pussies they let them.

If you get in my bed you’re getting fucked. No in betweens between fucked and making out. Your ass fucked the fuck off. And it will be one hundred and ten percent clear to you before you are allowed to even sit down on it.

Yes, I’m tolerant of homosexuals. I’m also tolerant of pussies but I do give them hell, and basically leave homosexuals alone. They have already decided they are not members of The Game, whereas, pussies still vie for the attention of the opposite sex and ranking within The Game for which there is one Supreme Rule, never submit to another man. As I have said before, there are only two legitimate means of contact between two males that do not violate that rule, a punch and stern eye contact that acknowledges the other.

When my wife mentioned back in college that one of her friends was sleeping in the same bed like you describe, the first thing my mother-in-law said was basically “Hmm, she’s gonna get herself raped like that”.

When my wife mentioned back in college that one of her friends was sleeping in the same bed like you describe, the first thing my mother-in-law said was basically “Hmm, she’s gonna get herself raped like that”.

One lefty* tried to turn that around and claimed that I wasn’t open minded about his beliefs. I told him, ‘hey, I went to public school; I use to get all my political ideas from CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, and the New York Times, just like you. So, yeah, I kind of know you too well.

* the political establishment and the left of more alternative media like the Guardian and the Village Voice differ at only the speed they are traveling to reach the same goals.

“Wait, wait… So when the libruls help out the poor it’s class warfare and awful but when they try to make them pay taxes it’s also class warfare and awful? So the GOP doesn’t really care either way they just hate anything the islamo commie Marxist Stalinist Leninist reverse vampire libs?”

And a few good ones, like this from a guy I have fanned from several years ago:

MasterThief 2012-07-13 05:09:22 PM Satanic_Hamster: Anyone willing to click on a reason link and explain what they’re crying on now?

Cheating (spanish-speaking immigrant) food truck owners out of an honest day’s pay because California can’t run a proper budget. The sort of abuse of power that you’d probably be up in arms about if a Republican was involved.

They own you, nicole, and your labor as well. The collective owns you. You have an obligation to the collective, and they expect you to fulfill that obligation, or they (or agents acting in their stead) will force you to.

Yeah, I have to say, reading that comments section, I had a “shit, I have not read anything this statist in a long time, I forgot what it was like” moment. They were just like, “Yeah, you do in fact totally owe taxes on your Indian cigarettes, because the State sez you do,” and I realized…they think that because the state says something, it becomes true.

Which is why we need to find a clean slate, like seasteading or the Moon. Unfortunately, our founders thought that it could work. They had the closest thing to a completely isolated continent and still the liberty experiment failed. Was the small poisonous seed of the remaining Tories enough? Was it really that the founders were an elite that somehow mananged to get popular backing for a short time, only to lose in the long game?

Remember the first time you rode the bike without falling down? Progs never got that far; they live in fear of the dangers of freedom just like most of us did until that damn bike didn’t pitch us in the dirt. Taking responsibility as a moral agent is terrifying; you have to answer for what you do!

Remeber, this started by the government of CA trying to extort additional money from food truck operators. Who are poor to lower middle class people, and often immigrants, trying to improve their lot in life through hard work at a dirty and dangerous job, risking their own meager capital, and they will only succeed to the extent that they provide something of value to their fellow men.

The country would be a much better place if everyone exhibited the work ethic and values of these heroic entrepreneurs.

And the attitudes and actions of leftists assholes like you and your comrades in the state bureaucracy is complete contempt and predation.

Look there, a mildly successful powerless person that we can rip off, let’s do it! is your unstated call to action.

You’re probably fooling yourself. If not, you have relegated yourself to the status of cattle. You have decided you exist solely for others and better yet others should eagerly toss themselves away for others too. You’re human shit.

It’s not, ‘nando, for you. It’s your inability to understand that we are happy to let you choose your own best actions that confuses you. You believe you know what’s best for yourself, as well as us. If you would simply stop at knowing yourself, your anguish would be so much lesser.

Cytotoxic|7.13.12 @ 10:31PM|# “Because it means you do not value yourself or your happiness. Altruism: the infinite evil machine.”

Not sure, assuming it’s voluntary. It could well be an evolutionary benefit, even in the extreme case of self-denying individuals who end up dying as a result. It gets truly evil when it’s enforced, and I’m sure ‘nando is more than happy to support that alternative.

Altruism means always valuing others over yourself. Even without coercion, it’s an evil idea. And it is the root of all the coercive ideologies.

Ayn Rand said she’d die to save her husband because it was a worthy trade (or something along those lines). The true Altruist says you must eagerly sacrifice yourself for The Other, never no mind if you consider them worthy,

‘Now the guy’s got the State as a partner. Any problems, he goes to the State. Trouble with the bill? He can go to the State. Trouble with the cops, deliveries, Tommy, he can call the State. But now the guy’s gotta come up with the State’s money every week, no matter what. Business bad? “Fuck you, pay me.” Oh, you had a fire? “Fuck you, pay me.” Place got hit by lightning, huh? “Fuck you, pay me.”‘

“There was a guy cruising bars pretending to be me and picking up women about ten to fifteen years ago,” Stossel told New York Magazine. “When I heard about it once, I dismissed it. When I heard about more times, I became a little alarmed….

It’s morally superior to make sure you’re ok before everyone else around you is?

It doesn’t even have to be. It’s just the smart thing to do. I can tell you have no EMT or Rescue training. If you had, you’d know that your ability to help people is greatly increased when you first care for yourself.

They haven’t thought deeply about these questions. They found a pseudophilosophy that tells them maximum selfishness is maximum morality, and like anyone with a teenager’s appreciation of the history of moral philosophy, they liked it.

Depends on the organization for which they belong, of course, and however much that organization value public relations. A mere slayer for the Dark Brotherhood with their altruistic dedication to the God of Murder will be forgotten if he falls for the cause and replaced by the next guy down in rank. They don’t want publicity. However, the United Farm Workers thrived on publicity during the Chavez era. If even the lowest ranked peon was to be shot dead by rednecks while picking tomatoes from the field, instant hero status for the unfortunate bastard.